‘Biz sector sees bullish dev’t this Year of the Dog’

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By Rhick Lars Vladimer Albay
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February 16, 2018
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Iloilo to enjoy ‘fruits’ of investment campaigns this Q1, says IBC exec

ILOILO City – With the city celebrating the Chinese New Year today and welcoming the “Year of the Dog,” the Iloilo business sector is optimistically girding for a bullish 2018 of growth and development.

Iloilo Business Club executive director Lea Lara told Panay News that they expect a robust year in business, especially with several new developments that come in Iloilo City’s favor.

“We are definitely enjoying the fruits of the city’s investment campaigns,” said the IBC officer. Among the headway heralding rapid growth cited by Lara are the introduction of new direct flights to and from Iloilo, a resilient public and private partnership, and a strong initiative to establish the city as a premier MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions and Exhibitions) destination.

“Iloilo City is seeking to increase our capacity in the hospitality industry by breaching the 4,000-mark of hotel and resort rooms,” explained Lara. “We have 3,200 Department of Tourism-accredited rooms as of the moment. With a couple of hotels already building,that goal is very much attainable in the next few years.”

Iloilo City is also looking forward to the upcoming British Chamber of Commerce Philippines (BCCP) Trade Mission this March, wherein the business sector expects “big investments, as well as the opportunity of building stronger ties with foreign businessmen.”

BCCP chairman Chris Nelson earlier expressed in a televised interview that they are set to bring a delegation of 50 businessmen from the United Kingdom to join their trade mission this coming March 8 to 9.

Lara said that she hopes that the upcoming BCCP trade mission will be as fruitful as the series of Hong Kong investment trips Iloilo welcomed in 2017.

“We’re happy with the successful Hong Kong trade mission last year as three of them have already set up shop here and have invested in the IT-BPO [information technology–business process outsourcing] sector,” related the IBC executive. “We’ll be trying to sell our agriculture and manufacturing areas for this [upcoming BCCP] trade mission.”

‘GAME-CHANGER’

However, Lara cited a potential “game-changer” this 2018: the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN).

Lara said the business sector hopes to get a clearer picture of the full impact of TRAIN to Ilonggos and local industries by the end of March this year, rounding out the first quarter of 2018.

“At this time in its first phase, TRAIN’s impacts are basically four: on petroleum, on the cost of cars, on sweetened beverages, and wages and income tax,” explained the IBC official. “For Iloilo, we may be highly benefited due to our large population of middle income earners. Yung tradeoff of course is the higher costs. You’re getting people with more spending capacity but bawionniyagihaponsahigher prices sing goods.”

“We will see pa these first few months,” she added. “We also have to see how, from our end, the businessmen could cope with the increases without hurting their operations. Because from what I know and experience, making customers bear the brunt of these hikes is the last thing businessmen will want to do given Iloilo’s very competitive climate.”

“Year of the Dog”

With festive vibe of the Lunar New Year in the air, Lara also noted the robust contribution of Iloilo’s Filipino-Chinese community to the local business sector.

“What the Filipino-Chinese community brings to the table is huge, a third of our 80 member companies are owned by Filipino-Chinese families,” related Lara. “[IBC] has national companieskase, and we cut all industries, hindilangsolely hotels, manufacturing firms, the service sector or agriculture, we’re a very diverse organization.”

Among the IBC’s current officers are Engr. Terence S. Uygongco, vice president – operations general manager of theFeedmill Division,Philippine Foremost Milling Corp.; and Atty. George Que, corporate secretary of Iloilo Supermart Inc. – both from prominent Filipino-Chinese families in Iloilo.

The Edgar “Injap” Sia II foundedDoubleDragon Properties Corp. is also among IBC’s member corporations, along with Brightside Properties and Resorts Corp. – which owns The Mansion hotel –led by Noel SinclaireSy, chief operating officer; the Carlos Uy Corporation, La Filipina Uygongco Corp., and the Henry Juan Tong-led Golden Portals Industries, among others./PN
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